text: Sandi Mann 2015-10-09T07:01:49-04:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/author/index.php?author=sandi-mann Copyright 2008, HuffingtonPost.com, Inc. HuffingtonPost Blogger Feed for Sandi Mann Good old fashioned elbow grease. The Psychology of 'Over-Sharing' tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2015:/theblog//3.7076858 2015-04-16T05:32:44-04:00 2015-06-16T05:59:02-04:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ 1. Boredom: It is easy to assume that those who feel the need to update their status every time they make a cup of coffee, put a wash on or let their cat in, must be bored. Indeed, they must have the time - and thus the leisure - to post these fascinating snippets of daily life. And, it is probably true that the mundane and routine events that are considered so significant to some people only do so because of the lack of bigger, more exciting happenings in their lives; after all, if there are no holidays, no, major achievements, no awards, no thrilling work projects, no fancy dates etc, then changing washing powder brand probably is quite enthralling - and thus considered worth sharing. 2. Egocentricity: Some people are simply self-centred and imagine that every little thing they do is of utmost interest to everyone else. We are, after all, the centre of our own world and sometimes it is easy to forget the 'own world' bit. All children are, by nature, egocentric, and some just get stuck in that stage and never really move on from it. This trait is usually associated with narcisstic personalities but to be quite honest, also true of most new (and not so new) parents; the creation and development of new human life is so enthralling that it is very easy to forget that you are not the only one with a living, breathing miracle in your sitting room. 3. Low self-esteem: This, I believe, is a major factor in over-sharing, and is more to do with the bragging and boasting posts rather than the mundane or mournful ones. The people who seem to gather exciting experiences - thrilling holidays, wonderful meals, wild parties, meeting C-list celebs - simply for the purpose of sharing them on social media are probably desperate to boost their fragile self-esteem. The message with these kind of posts is clear; look what an exciting life I lead, look how popular and awesome I am! Of course, such sentiments really reflect the opposite feelings and seeking reassurance from others in the form of admiration and interest, provides the sought-after validation that they are OK after all. 4. Loneliness; many lonely people simply yearn for affiliation. Their over-sharing is simply them reaching out to others in the hope that others will reach back to them with a 'like' or a comment. They are looking to engage with others via social media in a way that they are perhaps unable to do (due to geographical isolation or lack of social skill) in the non-virtual world. Those irritating pictures of their cat on the window-sill, their tree bathed in sunlight or their slightly burnt toast are really pleas for friendship. When you consider these possible reasons for over-sharing, sending anonymous complaints to an over-sharer is probably a bit cruel. Far kinder to either ignore their posts or even better, read beyond the words and photos - and indulge them. Perhaps you don't care that their baby moved off the mat, but hopefully you do care enough about the poster to show an interest in what interests them. Isn't that what real friendship is about?]]> It's Their Homework, Not Yours! tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2015:/theblog//3.6422388 2015-01-06T08:53:30-05:00 2015-03-08T05:59:01-04:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ I have often lamented the over-involvement of modern parents in their kids' lives but it's not only craft projects that parents are over-involved in. Modern 'project-based' homework is more a reflection of parents' efforts than their kids; I heard one mum recently shout across the playground to her son, 'what did I get in the recycling project'? (she got an A). Parents involve themselves in every aspect of school life, from running in every time their child has a problem, to falling over themselves to be parent helpers on school trips. And it doesn't stop at the school gate; so afraid are we of our kids making mistakes or doing things wrong that we hover over everything they do, like some kind of over-zealous quality control system. Over-involved parents, or helicopter parents (who are always hovering over their children) are part of the wider issue of over-protective parenting. If we are afraid to let them do their homework on their own, we are doubly afraid to let them play out on their own, or go to the corner shop, or ride their bike or any other number of activities deemed risky by the modern parent. And, in today's competitive and threatening world, who can blame parents for wanting to protect their kids both from harm and from lowered achievement? They need all the help they can get these days, right? Yet new research suggests that some of the common things parents do to help their children succeed might paradoxically be leading them to under-achievement. The overprotective instincts of modern parents are destroying children's independence, confidence and self-esteem, trapping them in a fearful dependency from which they might never escape. Research from Norway suggests that children are evolutionarily programmed to be risk takers, because this is how we learned to survive in a pre-helicopter parent era. Children who are allowed to take risks learn to trust their own abilities; it gives them self-confidence and builds resilience, since they learn to make mistakes and deal with them. Parental fear of harm befalling their children is natural, but leads to fearful, nervous children with low self-confidence and self-esteem - children who are afraid to try things and do things for themselves for fear of doing it wrong. They never learn to figure things out for themselves; mum and dad are always there to provide the answer. This applies as much to tree-climbing as it does to homework. The parents who obtained sheet metal to pound into rocket shapes for their adored offspring's school project did so out of love and because they wanted the best for their child. They knew their efforts would be far superior to their child's and indeed, their creations may have earned their child admiring glances in the playground, but they are not doing their kids any favours in the long-term. These are the same parents who, no doubt, will still be making sandwiches for their 16 year olds, writing job applications for their 18 year olds and collecting dirty washing to wash, iron and send back to their student offspring (along with a month's supply of home-cooked frozen meals). Their kids might be happy with their fully functioning rockets now, but the key thing is that they didn't do it themselves. They didn't learn to make a rocket and wouldn't be able to make one in the future. And what did they learn? That their own efforts are rubbish. Children gain confidence by working hard and mastering whatever it is they seek to accomplish; helicopter parents are squelching this budding confidence by their over-involvement. So, the next time your child comes home from school tasked to create a Tudor House or a piece of furniture, encourage them do it themselves. The end result might not to be so good - but remember that they are not building a house or a chair, but confidence, self-esteem and independence. And that is the best result of all. A version of this article first appeared in Mums and Dads Magazine http://www.mums-dads.co.uk/]]> The Psychology of Terrorist Martyrdom tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2014:/theblog//3.6231592 2014-12-01T04:53:08-05:00 2015-01-30T05:59:01-05:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ A recent research paper published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 1 seeks to analyse what motivates people to overcome the natural survival instinct that has dominated human existence since time began, to give up their life in a 'martyr' attack. Researchers from the USA and Canada have joined forces with Keren Sharvit from The University of Haifa in Israel (who presumably knows a thing or two about terrorism), to examine the psychological make-up of identified terrorists as well as non-terrorists. What they find might surprise you. For a start, the researchers and several before them, insist that suicide terrorists do not necessarily suffer from any psychopathology and that in fact, they tend to be rational and in touch with reality. In other words, they are not 'mad'. What they are, is so devoted to a cause of societal importance (in their view), that their own self-interest diminishes to the point where the cause matters more than their own life. In fact, martyrdom has some similarities with altruism (thought to be a personality trait) although with important differences; whilst both involve acting for the (perceived) benefit of others, altruism does not necessarily involve sacrifice, whereas martyrdom clearly does. There is a distinction, too, between martyrdom per se, and terrorist martyrdom. The former only involves sacrificing one's own life for a cause whilst the latter's reason d'etre includes harming others. So what is the psychological make-up of those prone to become terrorist martyrs? According the aforementioned study which analysed nearly 3000 people from a range of populations (including incarcerated Tamil Tiger terrorists), people scoring high on the newly-developed Self-Sacrifice Scale, also showed traits of altruism, belief in God and impression management (wanting to impress others). The study did not reveal any relationship between self-sacrifice and depression or normal suicidal ideation. This propensity towards self-sacrifice, as indicated by the Self-Sacrifice Scale, was proven with more direct measures too. The more people indicated a propensity to self-sacrifice, the more likely they were to 'kill' themselves in a video game test. Not only that, but people scoring higher on the Scale, were more likely to tolerate higher levels of pain for a good cause - as shown by their willingness to eat teaspoons on hot Tabasco sauce, when money would be donated to a charity supporting their cause for each teaspoon they ate. What this ground-breaking study by Belanger, Caouette, Sharvit and Dugas (2014) then shows is that it might be possible to predict who is likely to become a terrorist martyr by administering their Self-Sacrifice Scale to those at risk or suspected of being radicalised. But whilst the creation of a scale to measure this propensity could be of immense value, it still doesn't address the issue of what motivates a person towards these self-sacrificial tendencies. One theory put forward to address this is the Personal Significance Theory, first proposed by Kruglanski et al in 2009 2 This holds that self-sacrificial individuals are motivated by a need to attain personal significance i.e. to be recognised, valued, to matter - to be someone important. It is lack or loss of significance that drives people to restore it via commitment to a cause that rewards them through prestige, feeling of belonging etc. Lack of personal significance can drive a person to seek the deeper significance that martyrdom brings. And, in doing so, they leave behind their non-significant anonymity to earn enormous recognition that transcends their death and lives on for ever in the collective memory of the group. Thus, what seems to be anathema to the basic human survival instinct might actually be, paradoxically, in line with it. The terrorist martyr, in taking their life (and others), may attain the highly valued goal of 'living' forever, in the minds and hearts of generations to come. Fighting such a drive is difficult, so spotting the potential terrorist is perhaps our greatest weapon. Based on Belanger et al's new Self-Sacrifice Scale and the Theory of Personal Significance then, four key questions could help identify someone suspected of having the potential for martyrdom: How much would you be prepared to suffer in order to advance your cause? How much would you be prepared to risk your life for your cause? How much of your personal belongings and possessions would you be prepared to give up in order to advance your cause? How much do you seek to be valued and recognised as an important member of your community? Perhaps if these questions were asked in schools, mosques and homes around the country, we might be able to stem the flood of potential martyrs currently leaving our shores to pursue their dangerous goals - and look forward to a safer Christmas here too. 1 Bélanger, J.J., Caouette, J., Sharvit, K., & Dugas, M. (2014). The psychology of martyrdom: Making the ultimate sacrifice in the name of a cause. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 107(3), 494-515. 2. Arie W. Kruglanski, Xiaoyan Chen, Mark Dechesne, Shira Fishman and Edward Orehek (2009) Fully Committed: Suicide Bombers' Motivation and the Quest for Personal Significance Political Psychology, Vol. 30, No. 3, pp. 331-357]]> Is It Time to Abandon UK Spelling? tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2014:/theblog//3.5370371 2014-05-25T19:00:00-04:00 2014-07-25T05:59:04-04:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ So, I am probably the last person anyone would expect to be advocating for a relaxing of the rules. For heavens sake, I even correct people's Tweets (again, probably not something that raises my popularity levels). But, I've had enough. I'm fed up of correcting American spelling in my students' work. In fact American spelling has become so ingrained that even I am starting to ignore it at times. Indeed, many American spellings are now so commonplace that they are perfectly acceptable even in published UK work; for example, recognized and organization are now just as conventional as their UK counterparts (recognised and organisation). Other words are half-heartedly accepted; for example 'program' when used to describe computer applications is fine but 'programme' should still be used to describe training events one might attend - a distinction which even to me seems slightly ridiculous. And then there are words that few in the UK seem to even know the correct English spelling for anymore, such as analog (analogue please), anesthetic (anaesthetic), artifact (artefact), defense (defence), ton (tonne), jail (gaol), license (licence) and siphon (syphon). The final straw for me came this week when an academic journal I submitted a research paper to asked me to resubmit it using US spelling. Fair enough if this had been an American journal, but it is published in the UK. Apparently UK spelling is 'distracting' for American reviewers. And so, I am finally holding my hands up and admitting that maybe we can no longer hold back the tide of Americanisation (Americanization?) flooding over our written word any longer. Internationalisation (internationalization?) means that we are increasingly all one community and it is making less and less sense to insist on our own way of spelling things (even if it is our language). We have to accept that American English is dominant; spoken and spelt far more than UK English ever will be again. By clinging to words like colour, flavour and centre, we risk alienating ourselves from the rest of the world and whilst at best this could be viewed at quaint, at worse we could find ourselves being dismissed as parochial and out of touch with reality. It saddens me then, as a proud UK academic to say this, but it is probably time to abandon UK spelling and to adopt a standardised (sorry, standardized) format across the English-speaking world. UK English is set to go the way of Shakespearean English and continued resistance is probably futile. And, it would mean I can stop worrying about my students' American spellings and concentrate instead on their Twitter and text-speak (which, for the record, I will NEVER advocate for!!)]]> How Ghost-Writers Are Killing University Degrees tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2014:/theblog//3.5019870 2014-03-24T05:24:09-04:00 2014-05-24T05:59:01-04:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ And, if I am being head-hunted to ghost-write student essays so aggressively, you can bet that our nation's students are being targeted just as forcibly to buy into these 'cheating services'. Today's student need not complete a single piece of coursework themselves across their entire degree. For a relatively small sum (when compared with the 9K a year their degree is costing them), they can simply buy individually tailored essays, dissertations and even theses from the many sources pushing their services. It's easy; you simply submit your essay title, any lecture notes, the deadline and your credit card details - then go off to the pub and wait for someone else's lovely coursework to ping into your in-box. You can even specify what degree class you want the essay to earn, paying a premium for higher standards of work. Such services are not illegal. Most are advertised as to be used for 'guidance' only; in other words, the companies get around the law by insisting that their aim is to provide 'model answers' for learning purposes only. They usually insist, quite sternly, that no student should ever submit a piece of coursework that they have not themselves written. Yeah, right. Universities use expensive software designed to detect students who cheat, but Turnitin can only detect plagiarised work, not original work that has not been penned by the student. Thus, it is nigh on impossible to detect students who use professional essay-writing services. And, given the proliferation of these services, we can only assume that their use is increasing. Which means that it is highly likely that a large percentage of our University graduates will be clutching ghost-written degrees at their graduation ceremonies this summer. Ghost-writing is killing the value of the University degree. If we lecturers can't tell when students are cheating in this way, employers certainly can't. Horrifyingly, few subjects are exempt from ghost-writing services - including nurses, doctors and others whose honest abilities we might all be relying upon at some point. Ghost-written coursework is proliferating for a number of reasons, mostly economic. Today's student is often both cash-poor and time-poor, weighed down as they are under the burden of student loans. Most work to pay rent, some almost full-time hours on top of their supposedly full-time degree. Their sunk costs are so high that failure is not an option and whilst I am certainly not condoning students who cheat in this way, it is no wonder that more and more are turning to others to produce the coursework that they lack the time or ability to do themselves. If some students are unable to resist the lure of cheating, what about those who are facilitating it? The essay-writers are graduates themselves, with postgraduates and PhD holders in great demand. And yes, some are undoubtedly University lecturers looking to make a few quid on the side. Whilst it is the cheating student who is most culpable, all those in the chain are helping to devalue the very product that they are supposed to be building - the University degree. Universities are having to adapt by reducing the amount of coursework they give to students, which is grossly unfair on the majority of honest students, and of course, returns us to the memory-tests of traditional exams. Coursework was supposed to allow a broader depth of skill and knowledge to be assessed, but when we no longer know who we are assessing, this could turn out to be worthless. I would like to see action taken to stop degree ghost-writers in their tracks. Perhaps the industry should be regulated, forcing any ghost-written essay to be submitted by the seller to plagiarism detection sites so that should the student try to pass it off as their own, they will be caught. This won't stop the rogue sites, but at least it will send a clear message to students that passing off ghost-written work as their own is unacceptable. In the meantime, I won't be taking up any of the offers in my in-box to ghost-write student essays. After all, I could end up having to mark my own essay one day.]]> The Benefits of Bedtime Prayers (Even for Non-Believers) tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2014:/theblog//3.4715577 2014-02-03T04:44:57-05:00 2014-04-04T05:59:01-04:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ Teddy bear, teddy bear go upstairs, Teddy bear, teddy bear say your prayers Such a sweet nursery rhyme, reminiscent of more innocent times when everyone said their prayers before bed (even teddy bears). But how many parents these days sit down (or even kneel) with their freshly bathed and newly pyjamered offspring to offer a bedtime prayer before lights out? Well, if the dozens of books on bedtime prayers listed on Amazon are anything to go by, there are still plenty that do. And, surprising research suggests that they would be right to, for it seems that there are important psychological benefits to saying some version of bedtime 'prayers' with your children each night (but don't worry, you don't have to be a believer to benefit!). Historically bedtime prayers were part of every child's night time routine. Hot bath, and brushed teeth would be followed by a cosy story and a traditional bedtime prayer. The classic (and Christian) bedtime prayer for children was actually rather sobering: Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, If I shall die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take..I don't know if parents still say this version of the prayer with their children and if they do, whether their little ones are really comforted by it, but for many nowadays, the concept of a 'bedtime prayer' is something very different. Many parents these days have a bedtime prayer ritual that focuses, on gratitude and reflection - and these 'prayers' need not be tied in with religion at all. Jackie, mum of three explains: "I was brought up to say bedtime prayers to keep me safe before I went to sleep. I am not religious, so that sort of ritual didn't seem appropriate for my little ones, but I liked the idea of taking a few minutes at the end of the day to acknowledge and be grateful for what we have and what has gone well that day - and perhaps to think about things that are less good in our lives'. Religious parents might use set prayers to achieve these aims (eg The 'Shema' for Jewish parents, KaracharaNa, for Hindus or set Duas for Muslims) but non-believers can make it up as they go along - and reap the same benefits. And this is the point - saying some version of bedtime 'prayer' (technically, a prayer can probably only be described as such if it involves a specific attempt to address God or some deity) with your children has immense psychological benefit, whether you ascribe to a religious faith or not. Research shows that people who pray regularly enjoy better mental health and well-being than those who don't. Admittedly, part of this benefit is tied in with the belief that Someone is listening, but much is connected to the process of prayer that is about expressing gratitude, appreciation and reflection. And this is something that you don't need to believe in God to achieve. People who regularly take time to appreciate what is good about their life are happier than those who don't. In fact, Berkeley sociologist Christine Carter, suggests that gratitude is the key to happiness. This gratitude does not have to be achieved through traditional 'prayer' but through methods as diverse as keeping a gratitude journal, telling mum and dad, talking to a favourite toy or sharing with siblings. For young children, bedtime is the perfect time to stop and reflect on what has gone well that day, what they enjoyed, what is good about their life - and yes, what could be better. Too many children race through their week without pausing for reflection on how good life is; bedtime 'prayers' allow them to reconnect with all the positives so that they can boost their self-esteem ('I must be good at spelling because I got a star today'), realise that they are loved ('grandma came and gave me a kiss'), and help them realise they are blessed ('I am so lucky to have swimming lessons'). All of these are the basis for a happy child who will grow into a happy, contented adult. Real (ie God-focused) prayer is not only about appreciation, but also about self-awareness; acknowledging mistakes and 'atoning' for them. Similarly, the non-religious bedtime 'prayer' can help children look at what they my have done wrong and work out ways that they can do better tomorrow. There is no need to dwell too much on this though - we don't want them to be consumed by guilt as they drift into their dreams (and guilt-ridden children become anguished adults who are unable to let go of their mistakes). So, here is my own version of the ideal, modern bedtime prayer (belief in God optional): Dear Teddy/God/Mum/Granny/Peppa Pig (delete as appropriate) 1. I am so happy about the good things that happened today. These are...... 2. I felt loved today when...... 3. I did something not so good today. It was when............Next time this happens I will........ 4. I am proud about the things I did well today. These are.... 5. I am so lucky to have done/had.......today. And, when they have finished whispering these sweet little 'prayers', and the seemingly endless bedtime routine finally draws to a close, you might well find yourself invoking your own bedtime prayer along the lines of 'thank God she's asleep at last'. A version of this article first appeared in Mums and Dads Magazine ]]> Five Tips to Haggle a Discount tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2014:/theblog//3.4693922 2014-01-30T07:11:38-05:00 2014-04-01T05:59:01-04:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ Retail research suggests that people who haggle can save themselves hundreds of pounds a year. That's a lot of money, and allows this new 'haggling class' to counter the dwindling pound in their pocket. Sadly, most of us are still reluctant to play the negotiation game, whether out of embarrassment, awkwardness or simple lack of confidence. Yet psychologists who study persuasion techniques have these skills - and I think it is about time we shared our secrets. Of course, retailers would prefer customers not to know how to haggle. But, they have expensive psychology experts advising them on the psychology of persuasion in order to lure more cash out of shoppers; this article is about levelling the playing field just a bit. So, here are my top five tips based on psychological research for driving that bargain, whether it be a new car, phone, TV or designer dress: 1.Use confident language that is neither hesitant nor negative. Research published in the Journal of Applied Psychology in 2008 shows that hesitant phrases such as "I mean", "you know" and "isn't it?" reduce a negotiator's credibility and weaken your arguments. Tag phrases, such as 'don't you think?' and 'you know?' will also weaken your case. 2.Take someone with you; they can observe the seller's body language whilst you drive the bargain and watch out for signs that they might be lying - eg if there are discrepancies between the seller's language and body language or if they suddenly start avoiding eye contact etc. 3.Having someone with you also allows you to play the oldest trick in the book; good cop/bad cop. There are a few variants of this, but generally, one of you will point out the flaws in the product whilst the other's enthusiasm reassures the seller that you are still interested. Research by psychologists Bob Sutton and Anat Rafaeli back in 1991 suggests that it should actually be called 'bad cop/good cop' as it is most effective when the 'bad cop' starts off. 4.Avoid emotional leakage or 'tells'. We are pretty good at controlling our facial expressions but less good at the parts of our body further from the brain - hands and feet can typically give us away. So, don't tap your fingers or jiggle your foot when you see a product that you love. 5.Be aware of typical sales ploys like 'foot in the door' (where they get you to admit you like something about the product), 'alternative close' (asking you, for example, which colour you prefer), 'limited availability offers' (must end today!) or 'perceived scarcity' (only two left!). These all use clever psychology to play to human processes such as fear of missing out, the need to appear consistent or a reluctance to offend. Haggling for a better deal then, is partly about understanding the psychology of persuasion and partly about resisting their attempts to get you to spend more. And, as the recession bites even deeper, most of us need all the savings we can get. The retailers won't want you to know, but the discounts are out there for the taking. Happy haggling!]]> Ten Things Students Should Never Do tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.4312366 2013-11-22T19:00:00-05:00 2014-01-25T16:01:55-05:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ After fifteen years as a University Lecturer, I have seen and heard students do many things that frustrate lecturers. The above is just one such example, but the amazing array of ways that students can infuriate their professor never ceases to astound me. Here is my top 10 of what students should never do (and all of them are real examples that have happened to me): 1. Don't email your lecturer to apologise for not being able to attend a lecture and then asking 'will I miss anything important?' That is kind of the whole point of the lecture. 2. When asked during a lecture if anyone has any questions, do not raise your hand and ask 'will this be on the exam?' 3. Don't email or tweet your tutor whilst you are sitting in their lecture; the time of your tweet is logged so they will know that you were not deeply engaged with the subject matter that they have spent years carefully crafting and honing. 4. Resist the temptation to sign your emails to your tutor with a row of xxxxxs. 5. Don't miss a 9am lecture due to being hungover/oversleeping then ask your tutor for a private tutorial to go over what you missed. 6. Don't have too many grandparents die around coursework deadlines - thus warranting coursework extensions. It always strikes me that exam time and deadline time is a dangerous time for elderly relatives of students and there really ought to be a widespread warning to families of students at that time of the year. 7. Avoid copying chunks out of the text book that your tutor wrote and pass it off as your own work. There is a good chance they will notice. 8. Don't email your tutor with a vague query without explaining who you are. Example: 'Can you tell me what the essay question means?' or 'I didn't quite understand the 33rd slide of your lecture'. We might be currently teaching around 500 students across a range of modules, each with different coursework requirements, so help us out a little with some clues such as year of study, module, essay title etc. 9. Don't send draft work to your tutor that is littered with spelling mistakes and typos. Our job description does not include proof-reading your work. Yours does. 10. And finally, try to resist the temptation to whistle Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer very loudly during a lecture. Yes, this really happened to me recently (although, to be fair, I was discussing the 'Rudolph Effect' at the time). Oh and one more thing; it's never a good idea to trash your tutor on social media: they will find out (so, if any students of mine don't like this article, keep it to yourself!).]]> Is My Child Normal? tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.4140842 2013-11-04T19:00:00-05:00 2014-01-23T18:58:21-05:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ But, of course, the reality is that it takes parents of 'not normal' kids a long time to come round to this level of acceptance and prior to that, they are often plagued by angst that their little one is different from other kids. The reality is that most parents just want their children to fit in, to be socially acceptable, thrive at school and yes, be 'normal'. The idea that any difficulties might be due to a labelled syndrome, or 'special needs', is a frightening prospect for most. So, how can you tell if your child is 'normal' (or 'neurotypical' as is known in the trade)? Most parents who are worried tend to talk of difficulties in either social life or behaviour (or both). Typical social concerns include: • 'He has no friends' • 'No one will play with him' • 'She doesn't get invited to parties or playdates' • 'She gets on better with adults than her own age' Common behaviour worries include: • 'He is aggressive' • 'She flies into a temper frequently and at the slightest thing' • 'He can't concentrate on his homework - but can watch TV for ages' • 'She gets easily distracted' • 'Everything is a battle with her' Do any of these concerns indicate that there could be something wrong with your child? The unequivocal answer is 'it depends'. None of these concerns suggest there is a definite (ie diagnosable) problem but all of them could. It depends on the age of the child, the length of time they have been exhibiting the behaviour and, importantly, the range of habitats in which the child is like this. Children do go through phases and at times of transition (eg new term, new teacher, changes at home etc), could exhibit worrying behaviours. However, I always ask parents to look at the different arenas that their child moves in and to examine whether their problems manifest themselves in all of them. For example, there's many a child who is aggressive and 'oppositional' at home (especially with Mum - and this is actually a compliment as it reflects their confidence in her unconditional love), but their school has no concerns at all. There are children who are painfully shy in the playground, but mix perfectly well with select playmates that they have grown up with. Children who are eventually found to have 'special needs' like ADHD or Autistic Spectrum Disorder, tend to have difficulties in more than one area of their life, and quite often all. Their problems may be clearly manifested at home, school, after-school activities and social events. My advice to concerned parents is to keep a diary of incidents that concern you about your child. Note what happened and where they were. Speak to the school - and not just their class teacher, but also lunchtime assistants who see your child in social settings. Observe them in parties or social settings too. You might want to share your concerns with other mums and ask for an honest opinion - though I am a little wary of this as most will try to reassure you ('Oh, my child does that - don't worry') and will only see a narrow range of your child's behaviours. Once you have 'evidence', you might notice a pattern emerging. Perhaps your child tends to play up more when he is tired or anxious. Perhaps she is attention seeking, when you are preoccupied with her siblings. Or maybe your child is hard-going at home but sweet-natured in the classroom (I often advise parents that however difficult their child is with them, if they are OK around other people, there is probably nothing much to worry about). If you have gathered all your evidence and believe that your child has 'significant' (admittedly, hard to quantify) difficulties or areas of concern in more than one area of their life, then you might want to think about getting him assessed. Take your diary and visit your GP and ask to be referred to 'CAMHS' (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services) for an assessment (be warned, this could take several months). And, if you do find that your child is 'different', well, may I be the first to congratulate you.]]> Extreme Halloween: Has It All Gone Too Far? tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.4147713 2013-10-24T19:00:00-04:00 2014-01-23T18:58:21-05:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ This is not the horrific account of some terrible attack on a hapless victim, but a report of a young woman's Halloween 'experience' (Daily Mail 17 October 2013) at a seasonal attraction called Scare Kingdom in Lancashire. Visitors actually pay for this Halloween 'fun' that is so scary that they are given a 'safe word' in case things get too much. And this sort of experience is by no means unique; the entire country seems to be awash, at this time of year, with 'attractions' that would not be out of place on the set of a horror movie as each venue vies to provide the most 'chilling' Halloween experience. A quick Google of Halloween venues reveals a multitude of attractions with names such as 'fright night', 'farmaggedon', 'the morgue', 'field of screams','slasher' (featuring a man who 'skinned men and boiled women'), 'screamfest' and 'atmosFEAR'. Their aims? As one such attraction so charmingly puts it, to leave the visitor 'shocked and sickened'. These modern-day attractions are not to be confused with the traditional haunted house of yesteryear. These are extreme versions, not for the faint-hearted, and designed to instil real terror. They usually involve live actors, gruesome visuals and special effects - some really are like appearing in your own horror movie. I remember one student of mine, a strapping lass of 22, who visited a scare attraction one Halloween in Lancashire, being so terrified that she was unable to be alone for weeks afterwards. And, it's not just attractions that are getting ever more extreme at Halloween; so are the fancy dress outfits. Pumpkins, ghosts, spiders and witches are only for the little ones these days. Older kids (and adults) are offered a bewildering array of truly horrific garb such as 'psycho ward' (which Tesco and Asda were forced to drop after complaints from mental health charities), evil doctors and zombies - all covered in blood, guts and gore. You can, if you are so inclined, buy severed hands and realistic fake blood in hospital drip bags. One man created a Halloween display for his garden, complete with a realistic fake corpse, that was so horrific that he was asked to 'tone it down' by police (BBC News 17 October 2013). Even a advert for a Halloween event on a bus, featuring a 'zombie girl', has been criticised for being too scary (Huffington Post 22 October 2013). How has Halloween, that traditional time for trick or treating, come to this? Are our lives so dull and boring, that we crave such exciting, even depraved, thrills to liven things up? These Halloween experiences offer the same thing as fast fairground rides and horror movies do; the opportunity to experience an adrenalin rush (caused by shock and fear) in a relatively safe setting. It has traditionally been assumed that this adrenalin rush creates excitement that is craved by some people - or that the relief afterwards creates a euphoric high that is addictive. Yet a study by Eduardo Andrade (University of California, Berkeley) and Joel B. Cohen (University of Florida) published in the Journal of Consumer Research (2007), suggests that some people just enjoy being afraid. And, what they enjoy most is uncertainty, suspense, unpredictability and the unknown - all the factors that extreme Halloween attractions utilise to the full. I don't think the rise in extreme Halloweenism is as benign as some make out. Novelty is a big factor in fuelling fear, so attractions need to find ever more creative ways to scare their paying guests. Like everything, we habituate to stimuli, so what is scary this year, will no longer hold the same fear next year. Thus Halloween is likely to only get more scarier, more gruesome and more depraved as attractions attempt to draw in ever-more more blasé 'been there, scared there' punters. If it hasn't all gone too far already, I fear that it soon will, with people being seriously injured (if not physically, then mentally) at one of these 'scarefests'. Of course, it could be argued that the reason that so many people enjoy being scared so much these days is that we don't really have anything real to be scared about anymore. Most of us are, thankfully, far removed these days from the unpredictability of bombs, war and attack - so we rarely get to experience the fear emotion for real. I suspect that if we did, not many of us would want to revisit this at Halloween time. I bet the female victim who was held down then chased by the chainsaw man in the opening quote won't.]]> Five Ways to Spot a Liar tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.4063357 2013-10-16T19:00:00-04:00 2013-12-16T05:12:01-05:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ Would I Lie To You, co-written by Dr Paul Seager, we explore the common mistakes ordinary folk make when it comes to identifying if someone is trying to pool the wool over your eyes. For example, many people think that blink rate or gaze aversion (being unable to look you in the eye) are reliable indicators of deception detection - but in most cases, they are wrong. Here then are five more dependable ways to spot a liar; these are the cues that are the hardest for a liar to fake (for example, most liars know that gaze avoidance is thought of as a good cue to deception, so make great efforts to keep eye contact when they lie): 1. Inability to tell a story in a non-linear way; this means that they can tell their fake tale from beginning to end, but struggle more if asked to tell it out of sync. Trap them, then, by asking them about bits of the story in a different order and see if they struggle to answer you. 2. Lack of the word 'I'; in false accounts, people tend to drop the possessive and try to distance themselves from their account. The I may become we. For example, 'I went to the pub with some lads - I didn't even speak to a girl!' might indicate more truth than 'we went to the pub - it was just a lads night out'. 3. Use of passive rather than active voice: for example 'Tennis is one of Jane's favourite hobbies' (passive) rather than 'Jane loves playing tennis' (active). Passive tone can indicate that the liar is trying to distance themselves from their shifty tale (as might avoidance of the 'I' word above). 4. Increased repetition of common words and phrases: liars have enough to concentrate on with remembering their lies, so they tend to resort to tried and tested phrases to reduce their 'cognitive load.' Thus, you might find that with increased questioning, they tell their story in exactly the same way; truth tellers are often more able to use variety in their verbal expressions. 5. Mismatch of words with body language: liars might say one thing but their body language or facial expression contradicts them. For example, saying 'yes, I love your new hairstyle' but with folded arms, slight shake of the head, toneless voice etc. Of course, if it were really this easy, we wouldn't have written a whole book on lie detection, but the above five are a good starting point for any wannabe lie detector. And, if you are the one trying to tell a whopper, now you know what to do..... ]]> Teaching Burquared Students tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.4075390 2013-10-10T03:09:32-04:00 2013-12-09T05:12:01-05:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ A couple years on, I can now safely say that you get used to students whose faces are obscured. Yes, it is hard at first, and I have found my own eyes straying anxiously to theirs at regular intervals, to try to ascertain whether their owners had grasped my points. Over time, however, I have became more comfortable with the situation and more confident in the abilities of the students themselves to alert me if anything is amiss. It helps that most of the Burquared students I have taught have been fairly vocal and I have learned to take more notice of their tone of voice and speech mannerisms in place of facial expression. It also helps that most of these students happen to be hard-working, enthusiastic and conscientious. I am loathe to state that all Burquared students are so, or even that all Muslim women students are like that, for that in itself would be a form of benevolent racism. However, it is certainly the case that many such women are less distracted by elements of student life external to studying like partying, clubbing and drinking - which allows them to focus more on their coursework and lectures. For this reason, I have learned that the Burquared student is often a pleasure to have in a class. Of course, facial feedback is not the only objection many have to the Burquared student. Security issues are often cited as a concern and indeed, it is impossible to verify a student's identity when their face is obscured. At my University in the North West of England, we tend only to require identity cards at exams and yes, it seems daft to require this when some students can opt out. In fact, some Burquared students even have Burquared ID photos, which is clearly not much help in identification. But, the reality is that few students actually resemble their ID photos. As exam invigilator, I am required to check the photos against the students and many are simply unrecognisable. Students are usually young adults who tend to experiment with their image; their appearance a year or two in often bears little similarity to the nervous, fresh-from-school face peering from their ID photo. The answer to the ID problem will come eventually in the form of finger-print identification, as currently used by many schools in the UK for cashless canteen systems. That will happen, so the ID of the Burquared student is but a temporary problem. So, overall, do I think Burquas have a place on university campuses in this country? Like many educated people, I don't like what they represent. However, if they were banned, would students remove them or remove themselves? I fear that some students would no longer access higher education and that concerns me more. Education is power and if Burquared women in this country are excluded (or exclude themselves) from accessing this, then they risk losing more than we do by having them there. Banning students from wearing Burquas on the grounds of either security or teaching quality is thus based on spurious arguments (would a blind lecturer be banned for being unable to see any of their students' faces?). Objections to the Burqua on University campuses on the grounds of moral or philosophical concerns about whether it is appropriate to 'condone' their use in modern Britain is a different issue and I see no reason why those debates cannot be publically voiced by Muslims and non-Muslims alike. However, don't hide this healthy debate behind thin arguments about ID and facial feedback; in my experience, these are dubious concerns, possibly based on racist ideology, that are easily overcome.]]> Take a Chill Pill: Are Children's Games Creating A Nation Of Pill-Poppers? tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.4009782 2013-09-28T16:23:14-04:00 2013-11-28T05:12:01-05:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ 'Look', she exclaimed, 'I can rock it to sleep! And choose clothes for it! Isn't it cute, mummy?' Mmm, I agreed, my mind preoccupied with the day ahead. 'And look Mummy, if it can't sleep, I can give it a pill! ' What?? I nearly crashed the car in shock. Surely that couldn't be right? Surely a child's game would encourage pet 'owners' to sing lullabies or read stories, not pop sleeping pills if they struggled to achieve virtual sleepiness for their 'babies'? Now, my daughter had my full attention as I asked her what other pills she could give Speckles, her admittedly rather cute, Egg Baby. Apparently, there is a whole virtual pharmaceutical cabinet available to my innocent pre-teen to choose from. 'Chill Pills' for when the 'baby' is 'overstimulated'. Happy 'lotion' for when he is sad. And, of course, the sleeping tablets that Speckles has, apparently, been practically weaned on. As a Psychologist with a private practice specialising in anxiety conditions, I am alarmed by this game. We are arguably, already a nation of pill-poppers, with many of us turning to the medicine cabinet to solve most ills; are children's computer games like my daughter's virtual pet App merely reflecting this - or will they contribute even more to this culture? The medical profession certainly dishes out pills like smarties, with sleep disturbances, anxiety and depression being routinely 'treated' with pharmaceutical interventions (and let's not even mention the routine administration of Ritalin for kids with ADHD). Of course, sometimes these drugs are justified; a severely depressed client, for example, may well need medical intervention in order to function (and sometimes to survive). However, as a Cognitive Behavioural Practitioner, I fear that too many patients are being administered relatively cheap drugs in place of more expensive and intensive therapy. Drugs are not just cheaper - they are immediately available, in contrast with the 12-18 months waiting lists that are typical for psychological intervention on the NHS. I certainly see many in my clinic who have been offered drugs as an answer to their problems by their family doctor, but who have resisted in order to seek the private therapy I offer. And, I cure them - without drugs. Phobias, social anxiety disorder, obsessional compulsive disorder and even depression can all be treated without drugs and, in my view, often should be. Drugs treat the symptoms but not the cause, whereas therapy helps the client develop the coping skills to manage their difficulties. Drugs can encourage dependency and indeed, it is common for patients to be on medication for a very long time, often with only marginal benefit. Admittedly, used alongside therapy, medication can be very effective for some, but often the lack of financial resources in the UK for psychological intervention means that the drug-only route is often all that is on offer to most patients. And, to be fair, many patients are only satisfied when they walk out of the doctor's surgery clutching a prescription - the magic bullet that they hope will cure them with minimal effort on their part. Therapy takes effort, courage and guts - and time. Popping pills seems a lot easier. Games like Egg Baby are surely reinforcing the erroneous view that for every ill there is a pill. A view that is, in my opinion, harmful and damaging in the long-term. I believe they are helping to teach impressionable youngsters as they are growing into adulthood that every psychological problem, concern or discomfort should be sorted by popping a pill. We need to be teaching our kids resilience, and coping skills, not that as soon as they are a bit over excited, or stressed, or anxious, or can't sleep, they should pop a pill. Children's games that encourage kids to use drugs for every minor or temporary complaint are not harmless fun. They are insidious in that their influence is creeping, hidden and wrapped in cute and cuddly packaging. They pave the way for a tacit acceptance of prescribed and even non-prescribed uppers, downers, relaxants and stimulants. And the really scary thing is that most parents have no idea of the hidden menace that 'harmless' computer games like these might be harbouring.]]> Are ADHD Rates Set to Soar? tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.3578442 2013-07-11T06:28:50-04:00 2013-09-10T05:12:01-04:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ The most worrying new leniency in ADHD diagnosis is the fact that to be diagnosed, symptoms no longer need cause significant impairment; they just have to be present. For example, in DSM-IV, symptoms were required to cause some impairment (i.e. undermine the child's functioning) in at least two settings. DSM-V has changed this to "several inattentive or hyperactive-impulsive symptoms are present in two or more settings." Thus, symptoms must only be evident in more than one context but don't have to impair an individual's functioning in these settings. DSM-IV required "clear evidence of clinically significant impairment in social, academic, or occupational functioning." Now, the new criteria only require "...clear evidence that the symptoms interfere with, or reduce the quality of, social, academic, or occupational functioning." The reduction from 'clinical impairment' to 'interfere with or reduce the quality of' is important and allows the net of diagnosis to be cast far wider; children will still need to display six out of nine inattentive or hyperactive symptoms, but they will no longer have to prove that they cause 'clinical impairment.' This leniency might allow far more children to meet the diagnostic threshold for ADHD than before, and potentially lead to greater numbers being treated with medication or other interventions. Children who did not meet the threshold for DSM-IV may now be diagnosed as having mild or even moderate ADHD under the new criteria. The new guidelines also make it easier for an older adolescent or adult to get an ADHD diagnosis by raising the required age of onset and by requiring slightly fewer symptoms for those over 17. This increased leniency has implications for parents, schools, clinicians and for welfare, since children and adolescents with ADHD diagnosis tend to be allocated extra resources. There is the danger that children might be medicated when they don't really need it, or that more money has to be found to support increasing numbers of children who might now meet the lower threshold of diagnosis. All this is great for the pharmaceutical industry and for health care professionals such as psychiatrists (who have set the new criteria, of course), but is it really in the best interests of children? Of course, it is good that that children who need interventions but who just missed out on diagnosis before, might now access the input, resources and help that they need. As a University lecturer, I am also positive about the fact that students who might have missed out until now, might find it easier to now to get the support they need for their studies. But might there be a danger that in spreading the net too wide, we end up medicalising too many children whose difficulties might be helped with other, non-medical interventions? Could we also end up trivialising what is currently a very debilitating condition, by including, within its net, those who are less debilitated by it?]]> Why '100% Attendance Awards' at School Don't Work tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.3414693 2013-06-10T08:16:35-04:00 2013-08-10T05:12:01-04:00 Sandi Mann http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandi-mann/ The schemes are not without their critics though, the most vociferous of whom often voice their concerns on parenting sites like Netmums and Mumsnet; one parent complained that these schemes are 'basically rewarding immune systems' whilst another pointed out that 'it's wrong to reward something no one can control - i.e. being ill'. The real problem with 100% Attendance Schemes, however, is that they don't work. I am a firm believer in encouraging school attendance and discouraging truancy. In fact, I am running a project called Your Future, Your Life, (funded by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation) at the University of Central Lancashire which is an anti-truancy project. The project is a two year initiative consisting of a year's pilot in the North West of England, before being rolled out nationally in 2014. Your Future, Your Life, is, however, an attendance project with a difference. There are no 'rewards' given to kids for attending school. The project aims to move away from the culture of trying to motivate kids to attend school by offering them external incentives like cinema tickets, trips to themes parks and IPods, and instead looks at the young person in a holistic way so as to build up their internal motivation to attend more and aim higher. We want them to want to attend school because of the perceived benefits of what happens there, not in order to get a certificate, badge or pizza. 100% Attendance Schemes don't work. Not only do they penalise and stigmatise good kids who have the misfortune to be ill or have a medical condition, psychological 'over justification theory' suggests that if we give kids too many external rewards for attending school, they learn that school attendance only has value for these rewards. Psychologists have long known this; the first studies to demonstrate the 'overjustification' effect were conducted over 40 years ago in 1971. Edward Deci, a Professor of Psychology at the University of Rochester University in the US, asked students to solve puzzles for money or for no money. After the payment stopped, the researchers noted if the students continued to work on the puzzles. Those that had received money (an extrinsic motivation for solving the puzzles) did in fact become less inclined to work on the puzzles once they were no longer paid to do so. The students who had not been paid (and thus only had intrinsic motivation) continued to show an interest in the puzzles. Deci suggested that in a situation where an individual is to receive a reward for an activity, then the individual would attribute his or her behaviour to the reward instead of the activity itself. Deci's theory, published in the esteemed Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, led to the hypothesis that once an activity is associated with the external reward, a person will be less inclined to participate in the activity in the future without a reward present. Attendance schemes then might get kids to attend more whilst the schemes are in place (although even that is debatable; the really hard core truants tend not to respond to these schemes), but they don't produce long-term change and nor do they get them to 'attend' whilst they are attending. When the prizes stop, attendance rates tend to slip again; a study in 2008 conducted by Maurice Galton and John MacBeath, from Cambridge University, found "little sign" reward systems led to improvements in pupil behaviour whilst Emma Dunmore, head of psychology at Harrogate Grammar School, North Yorkshire, conducted a study in 2009 into the effectiveness of reward schemes and found that they produce little long-term benefit. Indeed, despite the commonplace use of such reward schemes nowadays, truancy rates in the UK remain at an all-time high; they have failed to fall in secondary schools whilst rates of truancy in primary schools were up 0.6% in 2012. It's time then, to ditch these external reward schemes that deliver short-term benefits but offer little long-term value. Let's stop punishing kids for being ill and instead look at ways to increase engagement and intrinsic motivation for all school children. We need to get kids to attend more in order to aim higher - so that they can eventually buy their own Ipods.]]>


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Reviews - Central Hotel0
16 to 18 Argyle Street, London, WC1H 8EG
Price FromView Rooms
Customer Reviews
Our reviews are from genuine LateRooms.com customers. We verify that the customer has stayed before leaving a review.
63% would recommend it to a friend
Customer service
Food quality
Room quality
Very close to st pancras
We needed to catch an early Eurostar train so it was very convenient being 1 minute's walk away.
Central Hotel
Great B&B and good value for money, clean and staff friendly.
2 mins walking distance to Kings Cross tube
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short stay in Kings Cross
I chose the hotel from web reviews which were favourable
My experience:
positives: friendly, helpful reception staff; clean room; great location
negatives: very small room and bathroom; noisy (my room was above a courtyard and noise reverberated around it); expensive for what is is (though I guess that's London)
probabaly at top end of expectations price-wise for the experience
it was fine but probably at the pricey end for a very basic stay.
very good position and suited our needs
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Comfortable, Quiet hotel
Central Hotel is well placed, equidistant between Euston and St Pancras.
We walked everywhere and never used the underground once. The rooms are small but that is to be expected in these lovely Georgian buildings. A very comfortable bed and a room at the back ensured a good night's sleep. The included breakfast was ok, though might I suggest the management provide better quality bread, rather than just boring white. I know it's a minor detail but it is something people will moan about. Other than that, I would stay there again.
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Excellent little B&B in central London.
Really easy to park at weekends - no restrictions or fees. Room small but excellent. Would definitely use again. The only thing that I didn't like was the cooked breakfast - cheap sausages and baked beans, acidic orange juice - but I wasn't there for the food.
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Overnight Stay
The hotel done exactly what it advertised.
Security issues with the window being broken and scaffolding leading to the main street.
Extremely noisy with paper thin walls and close proximity to Kings Cross.
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Central Hotel
If your looking for somewhere to lay your head forth night it's fine
London Stay
Stayed here for one night with a friend while visiting London for a sporting event at the O2, ideally located only a couple of minutes walk from Kings Cross Station.
Room was very small but clean enough and the staff were helpful and friendly. Breakfast was just okay. Overall would stay here again but only for a short stay with friends.
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subset: commoncrawl


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a software source code which run in gemei mp4 devices. the software just only for use to read pdf files. I am not the original author of this software, and I get the source code from network, I express my thanks to the original author,0 weekly downloads
IIP(Internet In Processes) is a framework for multitask software developing. The Aim is to develop an unified message dispatching scheme for both intra-process and inter-process scenarios.0 weekly downloads
inferno for openmoko
patches for inferno operation system (http://code.google.com/p/inferno-os/) to allow it run on openmoko open-source mobile phone (http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Main_Page) .0 weekly downloads
Linkx is a fork of the Links-2 web browser. This fork will in general be less stable, but more featureful than the standard distribution of links.0 weekly downloads
A simple C library (for any platform with glut available) to make it easy to write little programs that draw what you want on the screen and respond as you like to the mouse or keyboard. Comes with several short sample programs.0 weekly downloads
nano-X on android system, c/c++ implementation of the android system0 weekly downloads
The open bicycle computer (oBiCo) is an outdoor computer to be mounted on your bike. We are providing an open source based plattform to ether use Linux based software or go with a small GPL'ed C++ OS (Booting in just 2 seconds)0 weekly downloads
The openDarwin is an open implementation of the Quartz graphical windowing engine mainly used in the MacOS X. It's main objective is to be source level compatible with it.0 weekly downloads
pixelite - cross toolchains
pixelite provides a complete build environment (cross toolchain) for microcontrollers including a c library (newlib libc) and makefile framework: Atmel ARM, AVR, Renesas H8, SH, RX, NEC v850. Cortex M3 should also work. GDB support stubs are planned.0 weekly downloads
The QBoxHD and derivatives are HD digital receivers made by Duolabs. This project provides the official software components that run in these Linux-based devices: boot-loader, kernel, drivers and applications.0 weekly downloads
squio slimserver receiver
Replacement client software on Rio (or Dell) Digital Audio Receivers such that they connect to slimserver like a natively supported device.0 weekly downloads
Surimi is a home theater platform that support event-driven and plug-in concept for digital home and multimedia experience. It would base on UPnP and be cross-plaform ready (e.g., ARM/MIPS/Power PC with or without MMU)0 weekly downloads
Purpose of this project is to create a linux enable gui for a digital photo frame I recently bought coincidentally called 'Varnam' (http://www.e-bowl.co.uk/products/5010.html).0 weekly downloads
wmamp - Audio Player for Linksys WMA11b
wmamp is a replacement media player for the Linksys WMA11b that can connect to Apple iTunes (or other DAAP) music servers.0 weekly downloads
SVN UNDER CONSTRUCTION ==> xanadu4 is a sotfware platform:[server] [resources-streamer] [player] [xanadu4-streams] at [linux/bsd/unix] [psp] [mac] [win32] [wince] [j2me] [...]0 weekly downloads
Enveria Development IDE
The Enveria IDE for Rapid Application Development is an intuitive platform for programming robust GUI software. Keep Enveria open source, don't be shy - donate today!4 weekly downloads


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Wellfleet Drive-In Theatre
Rt. 6, Eastham, MA 02642
7 people saved this
First-run double features every night at the only drive-in on Cape Cod. Built in 1957; 100' x 44' screen, state-of-the-art FM stereo system, playground, and snack bar.
Of Note:
- Amenities: Accessible Facilities
5 Fall Foliage Hikes in the Berkshires
Crisp air, cool mornings, the earthy scent of the forest floor, and exploding colors as...
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Review: Lana Del Rey delivers on new EP 'Paradise'
Lana Del Rey, "Paradise" (Interscope Records)
Lana Del Rey's new eight-track EP "Paradise" shows the singer is still in the same emotional flux she was when she released her debut album 10 months ago. She's lamenting the pains of love.
Del Rey has an almost affected vulnerability in her voice, at certain points its quivering adds to the gravitas of the lyrics, like when she sings "Don't turn around, leave me high and dry" on the Rick Rubin-produced first single, "Ride." The song was co-written by Justin Parker, who helmed most of her debut, "Born to Die," along with Emile Haynie. "Ride" is as perfect as "Video Games," the single that propelled her into the limelight.
"American" uses simple strings and piano which allows her smoky, effortless vocals to take control. "Cola" continues the Americana theme, but in a playful, tongue-in-cheek way. And "Body Electric" sounds like it's straight from a Western film, where Del Rey is again playfully poking fun at America — "Elvis is my daddy, Marilyn's my mother," she claims.
The 26-year-old's entrancing vocals make it almost hypnotic to listen to anything she sings, but that's not always the case: "Bel Air" and "Yayo" are just fillers.
CHECK OUT THIS TRACK: Del Rey's sings the 1950s classic "Blue Velvet" as if it was written for her.
Follow Sian Watson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/sianwatson
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DEFINITION of 'Stimulus Check'
A check sent to a taxpayer by the U.S. government. Stimulus checks are intended to stimulate the economy by providing consumers with some spending money. When taxpayers spend this money, it will provide a boost to retailers and manufacturers and thus spur the economy.
BREAKING DOWN 'Stimulus Check'
Stimulus checks have been mailed out to taxpayers on several occasions. These checks will vary in amount according to the taxpayer's filing status. Joint taxpayers will receive twice as much as those filing singly. Those who have unpaid back taxes will see their stimulus checks automatically applied to their outstanding balance.
Voucher CheckA two-part combination of a check and voucher. Also known as ...
Stimulus PackageA package of economic measures put together by the government ...
Shovel ReadyA phrase describing the status of a project that is considered ...
Tax RefundThe return of excess amounts of income tax that a taxpayer has ...
Back TaxesTaxes that have been unpaid in the year that they were due. Taxpayers ...
Income TaxA tax that governments impose on financial income generated by ...
Is it Time to "Buy" Inflation?Based on recent data from the Treasury-Inflation Protected Securities (TIPS) market, it would seem that most investors aren't worried about inflation.
What a U.S. - Asia Trade Deal Means For BusinessThe U.S. and 11 other countries, comprising 40% of the world's total economic output, have finally reached agreement on the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
10 Wealthiest States in the United StatesA review of the 10 richest states in America as ranked by median household income.
How Worried Should We Be About China?An economic slowdown, a freezing up in trade and plunging markets and currencies are casting a shadow across Asia—and the globe. How worried should we be?
Which GOP Candidate Brings What to the Table?What are the major GOP presidential candidates' economic plans and how do they differ?
Benefits of China Changing It's One Child PolicyChina's one-child policy is changing, and investors are looking for ways to cash in. The reform might not have the effects that many anticipate, however.
START-UP NY: How a Tax-Free Zone Would WorkSTART-UP NY is an initiative designed to attract companies to New York State by giving them 10 years of tax breaks. Sounds good, but is it a success?
Is Another Bear Market Ahead?With market volatility recently reaching its highest level, investors are questioning what the outlook is for U.S. stocks in 2015 and beyond.
Explaining Capital FlowsThe movement of money for investing, trade or business production, is commonly referred to as capital flows.
Explaining Economic IntegrationEconomic integration reduces or eliminates trade barriers among nations, and coordinates monetary and fiscal policies.
Where does stimulus economics come from?Depending on which type of economist you talk to, stimulus economics originated from the ideas of either a book published ... Read Full Answer >>
Do stimulus checks work?In theory, stimulus checks are intended to increase the amount of capital in the economy. By giving back tax dollars in ... Read Full Answer >>
How do government-issued stimulus checks affect the economy?Stimulus checks are payments given to individuals by the government based on taxes paid in the previous year. The hope is ... Read Full Answer >>
What are the risks of annuities in a recession?Annuities come in several forms, the two most common being fixed annuities and variable annuities. During a recession, variable ... Read Full Answer >>
Where are the Social Security administration headquarters?The U.S. Social Security Administration, or SSA, is headquartered in Woodlawn, Maryland, a suburb just outside of Baltimore. ... Read Full Answer >>
What is the Social Security administration responsible for?The main responsibility of the U.S. Social Security Administration, or SSA, is overseeing the country's Social Security program. ... Read Full Answer >>


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Fairfield Inn & Suites by Marriott
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TripAdvisor Reviews Fairfield Inn & Suites by Marriott Lawton
Travel Blogs from Lawton
Mountains, Longhorns and Lizards... OH MY!
... buffalo remained out of sight. Not one buffalo was to be found despite our singing the water buffalo song multiple times in a sad attempt to entice them. NO amount of veggie tales was effective, but I must say that the memories made with the family are fabulous. We climbed all over the rocks and hicked all over the rockland. I had no idea that Oklahoma was so beautiful! Too bad about the buffalo though. Sadly no-one wants to watch ...
Eisenhower Class of 65 - 50 Year Reunion
... better understand him. He had a lot of very good friends and enjoyed his high school years. He really was kind of a wild child and supports what his mom has been saying all these years.
Lawton is a nice town and very oriented to the military personnel. Saw lots of ways that they show respect for the troops stationed there. The surrounding area is nice, pretty flat and not highly forested but not a lot of farmland there.
We were concerned ...
Departure Day Finally Arrives
... Travails." Rick and I are departing from DFW and the Karpies from Rochester, NY. We will meet up in the morning in Madrid for the final flight to Athens. We are all packed light to carry on. Well....Ricks bag too big to carry on. No biggie just checked it. We are off to Madrid . After a rice stuffed portobello mushroom for dinner and watching The Imitation Game that I highly recommend (Rick watched Whiplash). 3 Advil PM later and we are in ...
Digging Up the Old You
... the vast outdoors again created a thirst in me I forgot I still had. Leaving me with a lingering question, "Should I move back to the United States?"
On the flip side of the coin I was blessed and surrounded by the company of my brother, Scott. His home and family aluminate love, laughter and down to earth happiness. Their joy and laughter filled me up from the inside out! Just yesterday my brother and I began working on Cedar's halloween costume. ...
Basic training graduation excitement!!!
Went to OK for my husbands basic training graduation. Small little town. Oklahoma City was near by. We didn't get to explore much because everything was fast pace. It was by far one of the happiest times by far though. Seeing him after a couple months and watching him graduate from basic, starting his career in the US ...


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Transwoman. Woman. 3rd Gender. Spirit. Body. Mind. Unbreakable....
I'm a pretty Black TransGirl with an Ocean for a mind and an unbreakable spirit. Gentle, Sweet, &terrible who will cook Red Velvet Waffles barefoot in your kitchen, while reading the latest feminist manifesto and taking kick boxing classes.
Back & Forth from NYC and Atlanta for Work these days
*sorry if you tried to message me. just cleared my inbox : )


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Hold down Control (PC) or Command (Mac) key + mouseclick to select more than one option
Posted by Anonymous on 2011-03-22
You must try their Gyro Greek salad and their split pea soup! Delicious!
Posted by downtowngirl on 2008-02-18
I think they are only open for lunch but the food is excellent!


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View Poll Results: Do you love Henry?
- Voters
- 73. You may not vote on this poll
Results 1 to 5 of 24
Thread: Let's talk about Henry
June 27th, 2014 05:53 PM #1Senior Member
- Join Date
- Jul 2012
- Posts
- 8,392
Let's talk about Henry
I have such a mixed relationship with Henry. Sometimes I hate it and sometimes I love it. Right now I'm crushing on it again, and hopefully this time it will stick around.
What do you think of Henry? I know it's a Nameberry favorite, so hopefully a good number of people will chime in to share why they love Henry.
Last edited by southern.maple; August 3rd, 2014 at 03:55 PM.Emily / 20 / American
Samuel • Edward • George • James • Thomas • Arthur
Girls' names are a struggle.
June 27th, 2014 05:59 PM #3Moderator
- Join Date
- Sep 2012
- Posts
- 2,990
I love Henry. I like to pair it with something with a bit more sass, so I have Henry Marcellus on my list at the moment, but I also love the classic Henry Elijah. It's very charming and ages extremely well. It's one of those names that I can picture on any age. The only problem I have with Henry is that I'm a nickname person and I don't like any of the potential nicknames.Dany | Mama to a kit named Zola Bastet
Could I have your thoughts in this thread? LINK
Alaric Matthew (Ronen) | Elijah Serafin (Lior) | James Balthazar (Henrik) | Jasper Samuel (Orion) | Gideon Rhys (Malachi) | Edmund Leander (Giles) | Damian Frédéric (Blaise)
Lilith Seraphine | Freyja Hermione | Katarina Beatrice | Cordelia Violette | Caroline Safira | Hazel Andromeda | Saskia Temperance | Saskia Rosemary
Votable Name List
() = Second middles
June 27th, 2014 05:59 PM #5
Henry has been one of my favourites forever (right up with Matthew and Louis) because it's incredibly versatile. One problem I tend to have, is finding the confidence to use the names on my list (like Doris, Florence, Minnie, etc), because to some, they're crusty/old/unfashionable/horrid/child abuse/whatever, but Henry's one of those old fashioned favourites that never goes out of style, without being everywhere in the way that Elizabeth and say, Michael are. Henry's got some balance to it, classic, but not overdone, and with no pronunciation or spelling issues whatsoever. I've yet to find a bad thing about the name Henry to be honest :P
The Henry combos I've had in the past are;
Henry Caradoc
Henry Alexander
Henry Quinn
Henry Lucas
Henry Matthew
Henry Patrick
Henry James
Henry Michael
Henry Liam
Henry Joshua
And Henry works beautifully with your listhave courage, and be kind.
Edith, Florence, Sybil, Elsie, Evelyn, Lucy, Matilda, Vera, Poppy
Violet, Mabel, Minnie, Jane, Marigold, Lily, Cora, Martha, Alice
George, Atticus, William, Thomas, Henry, Daniel, Ernest, Albert
Matthew, Charlie, Louis, Hugo, Patrick, Andrew, Lachlan, Winston
♔ http://pixiedustandbabynames.blogspot.ca/♔
June 27th, 2014 06:03 PM #7Piers Lachlan | Gray Everett | Tadhg Wilder
Jack Wilder | Henry Birch | Charlie Hawthorne
Maebry Elizabeth Posy | Eloise Margaret Birdie | Coralie Jane Magnolia
Sophie Jane Magnolia | Emma Eloise Maebry | Isabel Margaret Birdie "Isby"
❤ heart my son ❤
June 27th, 2014 06:11 PM #9
I'm in the same boat, unfortunately. I think it's quirky and gentlemanly and goodhearted, and I love hearing it, but in general I'm much more excited about it as a middle name. But sometimes I crush on it really, really hard, and I especially love it paired with my top choice for a girl (I think Isabelle and Henry are adorable together!). Sometimes it's just sort of boring as a FN. That, and I have an impossible time coming up with a combo. I can't find anything that flows right and I think is pleasing aesthetically; ugh. I love Henry, but sometimes I hate him. I think he fits really great with your list, though, and I think Hal and Harry are cute nns. I'm not a huge fan of Hank or Huck, though, nearly so much. I think meeting a truly great Henry would change my mind, though. For now, I keep considering him as a middle. I'm especially a huge fan of Daniel Henry and Abbott Henry.


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At Least They're Already Yellow
The Simpsons in Lego.
Even those among us who are understandably tired of small yellow blocks can indulge The Simpsons in Lego form. Ralph, Apu, Itchy and Scratchy, and even Flanders are coming in May to coincide with the series' special Lego episode.
How Mass Shooters Get Their Guns Here are the origins of every gun used in the high-profile massacres of Obama's presidency.
The Juice
Even Appalachia Is Walking Away From Coal Why the Tennessee Valley Authority is about to retire a massive chunk of its coal-burning plants.
Financial Firms Hire Academics to Conduct Favorable Research. This One Got Caught, Thanks to Elizabeth Warren.
What We Talk About When We Talk About the Man Bun A man and a woman who sometimes wears a bun debate.
TV Club Podcast
The Empire Podcast: The Second Season Is Here Hear Slate's complete commentary on the newest Empire episodes.


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Jonathan Keith Smart (born September 21, 1964) is a retired American basketball player and current assistant coach for the Miami Heat of the National Basketball Association (NBA). He is perhaps best remembered for hitting the game-winning shot in the 1987 NCAA championship game. The shot gave the Indiana Hoosiers a 74–73 victory over the Syracuse Orangemen. He transferred to Indiana from Garden City Community College in Kansas where he was a two-year standout and Jayhawk Conference Player of the Year.Wikipedia
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Dance - Russian ballet, flawed but brilliant
by Paul Parish
Time was, if big-time dance came to town from New York or Europe, they'd play San Francisco's Opera House: the Royal Ballet, the Royal Danish Ballet, American Ballet Theater, Dance Theater of Harlem. Most-anticipated were the great Russian companies, the Bolshoi and the Kirov, which began to appear frequently ca. 1990, after the Iron Curtain came down. For these hot tickets, fans would camp out overnight on the steps of the Opera House to be first to get tickets. (read more)
Film - Savoring cinema in Mill Valley
by David Lamble
The 2015 Mill Valley Film Festival, running Oct. 8-18 at Mill Valley's Sequoia Cinemas, Throckmorton Center, Lark Cinema and Rafael Film Center, has an unusually rich lineup of queer films, plus a sizzling selection of American independent cinema and some likely award-season candidates. (read more)
Out There - Sweeney meditations
Out There was in the house for the final performance of San Francisco Opera's Sweeney Todd last week, surely one of the highlights of the young fall arts season. (read more)
Out & About - Celebravery
What's in a line? A bold stroke of forthright truth, a fictional vision, a dancerly swoop, a sardonic jab at pop culture? Too many choices this week... (read more)
Theatre - Filipino dreaming
Checkers Rosario could be described as a director of B movies in the Philippines, except that that grade level is too generous. (read more)
Theatre - Enterprising dragsters
If you were born the year when the original Star Trek debuted on television in 1966, you'd be pushing 50 right now. (read more)
Music - Looking back from 60
To honor Anne Sofie von Otter on her 60th birthday, Deutsche Grammophon has issued a 10-CD box of this wonderful artist's favorite recordings. (read more)
Television - Papal dispenseries
Where to begin with this week on TV? Viola Davis having a lesbian sex scene with Famke Janssen? Killing of a trans teen on Law & Order: SVU? (read more)
Music - Spectacular operatic voices on disc
Opera season on disc rarely gets off to the spectacular start this one has. (read more)
Fine Arts - Women behind the lens
Though it has been stated before, it's worth repeating that female artists across all mediums are denied the exhibition space they deserve... (read more)
Books - Stormtrooper startler
Andrew Wackerfuss' just-published book Stormtrooper Families: Homosexuality and Community in the Early Nazi Movement will no doubt raise many eyebrows. (read more)